ZERO June 24, 1987
Agora Ballroom, West Hartford, CT

Source: Alan Bershaw's master cassette recorded on a Nakamichi 550 with Dolby B
Left: SBD Channel - mono house mix direct
Right: Room Channel - Sennheiser 441 (at the board)

Lineage: Master Cassette (Maxell UDXL2-S Dolby B encoded) -> Nakamichi Dragon (Dolby B decoded)-> Lexicon Lambda-> Logic (tracking, channel time alignment)-> xAct-> FLAC

Personnel:
Steve Kimock - guitar, vocals
John Cipollina - guitar, vocals
Lowell “Banana” Levinger - keyboards, vocals
Martin Fierro - sax
Bobby Vega - bass
Greg Anton - drums

Tracklist:
1. soundcheck/tuning 03:54
2. Baby Baby-> 08:43
3. Tangled Hangers 07:43
4. The Core 08:59
5. Many Rivers To Cross 10:14
6. Riding with the King 08:38
7. Tear Tags Off Mattresses 13:11
8. Severe Tire Damage-> 08:18
9. Little Wing 06:17

Notes:

This is a fresh 2017 master transfer done on better equipment and corrects an issue that has bugged me since I first recorded this. Because the Sennheiser 441 taper was also near the board at the rear of the room, his signal (of the stage) was lagging nearly 30 milliseconds behind the direct board signal going into my 550. As such, the master and all previous transfers had the two channels too far out of sync, resulting in a cavernous listen. The Agora WAS a cavernous sounding room, but I found the delay between the two channels annoying.

I made copies of this master for all my friends that were there and many others over the years, so I know its commonly circulating. There's even a questionably remastered version where someone simply mixed it to mono, resulting in an even muddier listen (that still sounds cavernous!)

This is the first time both channels are closely time aligned and it sounds considerably better, while still maintaining that Agora ambience. I've also included the complete tape, including what passed for a soundcheck as they were tuning up. The first 2:32 of the first song has the soundboard feed in both channels. They were mixing the house in mono and the board mix was far from ideal, so during the first song I decided to take a patch off the 441 taper, in an effort to get the best of both worlds. The channel split is from there on out. Mix adjustments occur during the first two numbers. I was also messing around with the separation and levels, but all that settles down about halfway through "Tangled Hangers."

This was a good night all around, with Cipollina in fine form. CT reggae band Cool Runnings opened. Alan Bershaw